A New Jersey mayor warned Tuesday that troubling drone sightings in the state could be linked to missing radioactive material, even though federal officials say the quantity poses no serious threat either way.
Belleville Mayor Michael Melham said the drones flying in a grid-like pattern over his Essex County township are “looking for something.”
“What might they be looking for? It could be radioactive material,” Melham told Fox TV’s “Good Day New York.”,
“It was a shipment. It reached its destination. The container was damaged, and it was empty,” Melham said.
US Nuclear Regulatory Commission issued an alert Earlier this week a piece of medical equipment used for cancer scans was “lost in transit” on Dec. 2 when it was being shipped from Nazca Cancer Center in Newfield, Gloucester County in South Jersey.
The device, Eckert & Ziegler model HEGL-0132, was supposed to be properly discarded — but its “shipping container arrived at its destination damaged and empty,” the agency said.
The item, known as the “PIN source”, contains a small amount of the radioactive chemical germanium-68, which is used in PET scanners to calibrate accuracy.
The radiation source is considered to be below Category 3 on the International Atomic Energy Agency scale – meaning that it is “very unlikely to cause permanent injury to persons or contains too little amount of radioactive material to cause any permanent injury.” It won’t be the reason.”
News of the missing devices sparked concern on social media, with some netizens speculating that mysterious drones patrolling the skies of New Jersey were scouring the area for radioactive waste.
The unfounded theory was also promoted by John Ferguson, CEO of a remote-aircraft-systems company in Kansas, who claimed in a video viewed nearly 3 million times on Twitter that drones try to “sniff out” gas leaks, radioactive material or Are doing. Something else.
“The only reason why you would fly an unmanned aircraft at night is because you’re looking for something,” Ferguson said in the clip, adding that he believes drones are not a danger to the public.
This idea got further strength during Podcast King Joe Rogan’s time Ferguson’s clip said Left him “very concerned” about the status of the drone.
Tri-State residents and lawmakers are angry at the lack of explanation from the federal government over dangerous drone sightings that have been reported for a month now.
The Biden administration has repeatedly downplayed the situation. White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Said drones are not a public safety concern And most of the reported sightings are actually manned aircraft.
The Department of Homeland Security and the FBI announced late Monday Deploying drone detection technology and infrared cameras to determine what, if any, threat there is from unidentified flying objects.
(Tags to translate) US news (T) Metro (T) Conspiracy theory (T) Drones (T) Mayor (T) NJ drone sightings
